


Faith

by Vipersweb (Rhianona)



Series: Ashes in the Fall [5]
Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003), Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Ashes in the Fall, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-03-20
Updated: 2008-03-20
Packaged: 2017-10-08 20:31:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/79261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhianona/pseuds/Vipersweb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kara wears her faith quietly</p>
            </blockquote>





	Faith

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Abyssinia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Abyssinia/gifts).



Kara wears her faith quietly. Just as Teyla and the Athosians believe in the Ancestors – notwithstanding the reality they have had thrown at them – Kara worships her gods. Nothing overt – and that tells Daniel it is, in fact, quite important to her. Kara is loud and brash and not afraid to tell anyone what she thinks about them. But when it is important, where she feels the most – she gets quiet. So Daniel doesn't question when he stays in her quarters and sees the unobtrusive altar in the corner.

He knows she prays – he even knows that Teyla brings her back incense and candles after she visits the Athosians or a few of their other friendly allies. The altar is beautiful in its simplicity: a gorgeous dark wood covered in hand-woven cloth, a gift from the Athosians. On each of the four corners, stand the candles, ready to be lit and hear her benediction. The incense lies in a brazier at the top, its perfume softly wafting through the air. Representations of Aphrodite and Artemis, the two gods Kara worship sit in the center, their faces sketched by Kara's hand. From comments she's made to Teyla, he knows that she had two statues of the goddesses in her bunk on _Galactica_ and that they brought her comfort when she needed it most.

***

It amazes him, how much faith she holds. It is at odds with the majority of the people who work for the SGC.

It is at odds with him.

Daniel lost his faith long ago. The Goa'uld and the Ori ensured that he keeps his faith in the tangible rather than the intangible. He's fought and taunted and killed and been killed by those claiming to be a God or the chosen of the Gods for so long that he can only look with bemusement at those who still believe in a higher power.

Even his time as an Ascended has spoiled his belief; the Ascended so powerful yet so determine not to interfere on the mortal plane. Content to let man struggle against their oppressors and conquerors, villains they abandoned the fight to millennia ago. He has seen and rebelled against their policy of non-interference, even as the galaxy screamed in its death throes and is not impressed.

But Kara, Kara who has lived through the holocaust of her civilization, who has fought against things of man's creation hell bent on destroying their masters in the name of its God, still believes.

It confuses him as much as he wishes he could have that same faith. But that has dried up in him – he barely has faith in his fellow man. Belief in a higher power is all but anathema to him.

***

When the holidays arrive, he corners Teyla and asks for her help in commissioning a pair of statues to replace the picture representations on Kara's altar. He ignores Teyla's knowing smirk as she take him to the market on Farin. She introduces him to a friend of her father, who leaps at the chance of carving the two goddesses. Daniel hands him a picture he's printed of them, statutes from Earth recovered in an archaeological dig, now sitting in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He thinks Kara will like the connection to Earth.

Teyla returns to Farin for them and Daniel is stunned at their beauty. The dark stain of wood, polished to a high sheen, the goddesses captured in an iconic pose. He wraps them carefully in a soft cotton cloth and hides them away.

Kara grows quiet when she opens his package and his nerves grow steadily as she gently traces the curves and lines of the statues. He wonders whether he has done the right thing until she looks up and meets his eyes, tears shining and a kiss that says thank you.

***

"How do you believe?" he asks her one night, months after they have been together, when he finally starts to believe that maybe, just maybe he won't wake to find her nothing but a dream.

Kara looks at him with one of her famed looks of exasperation. "What the frak do you mean?"

"How can you continue to believe in your gods, even after everything?" he persists.

He holds his breath as silence descends. Kara has a temper and he's never quite sure how far he can push before it comes to the fore.

"How can I not?" she finally responds. She pushes up so she is looming over him, the soft light in the room surrounding her in a halo as he gazes at her myopically. "Everything that has happened, has brought me here, to you. The Scriptures told us that the Arrow of Apollo would lead us to Earth. And even after everything that has happened, we've found the way." She grinned. "I mean, not actually _to_ Earth, but we've found the thirteenth colony… Hell you know what I mean."

And he does because he's heard of her legends and the scavenger hunt that has taken the Fleet from their colonies to the edge of their known galaxy and into this one, fighting for survival in a way that seems common to all humans.

"I know that the Gods have been blamed for things. Hell, the frakking Cylons insist they act on behalf of their God! And maybe I shouldn't believe in the Lords of Kobol, but the things I've seen, things that were written in the Scriptures hundreds of years ago? How can I not believe?"

He doesn't have an answer for that.

***

He loves to watch Kara in her benedictions. The graceful and slow movements are in such contrast to her normal frenetic energy. Her prayers are silent, her lips move as she mouths the words, bows her head, passes the flames and incense over the altar and through her hands, breathing in its sweet smell, the heat of the flames on her face. Her hair smells of smoke and mystery and spice as he breathes it in when she rejoins him on the bed.

It's in moments like this, when she's in his arms and he has the tangible evidence of her faith that he thinks she has enough faith for them both and he starts to believe. Atlantis hums around them and the scent of incense a smoky perfume that teases his nostrils as he drifts into the darkness of sleep, Kara and everything she means encompassing and anchoring him through the night.

_fin_

**Author's Note:**

> Written for abyss' birthday


End file.
